BRADENTON – The 17th Annual Lucky Ducky Race for Pace was held on the Manatee River on Saturday, April 11, and it raised more than $210,000 for the Pace Center for Girls, Manatee organization.
A message posted at the Pace Center for Girls, Manatee Facebook page Sunday afternoon says, “Thank you to everyone who supported the 17th Annual Lucky Ducky Race for Pace, helping Pace raise over $210,000! Your sponsorships, partnerships, adoptions, volunteerism and sharing Pace ‘Find the Great in Every Girl.’”
The funds raised will be used to cover the Pace Center’s regular operating expenses.
According to the Pace website, Pace Center for Girls, Manatee is part of a network of 18 Pace centers that have served more than 40,000 girls since 1985. Pace classes are aligned with the local public school district, and the goal is to ensure the participating girls stay on track academically and earn the academic credits they need.
Serving as Pace Manatee’s largest annual fundraiser, this year’s Lucky Ducky Race for Pace featured 27,255 adopted ducks – a bit shy of the 33,000-duck adoption goal, but still an overwhelming success.
The rubber ducks were adopted in advance, online or in person, in the name of an individual or company, or through one of the 80-plus fundraising duck adoption teams that participated this year. The fundraising teams included many businesses and organizations affiliated with Anna Maria Island.
It cost $5 to adopt a single duck for the race, $20 to adopt five ducks and $100 to adopt a flock of 30 ducks.
Larger, VID ducks (very important ducks) were offered and adopted as part of a $400 package that also included 125 smaller ducks.
The smaller docks were contained in a bin previously built by U.S.A. Fence and placed on a motorized barge provided by Quality Marine Construction owner Harry Blenker and tied up to the Bradenton Riverwalk Pier in downtown Bradenton. For identification purposes, each duck had a serial number affixed to its bottom.
AMI Dolphin Tours owner Ben Webb provided the large pontoon boat that served as the VIP seating and viewing area while docked at the Riverwalk Pier, next to Blenker’s barge.
“We’re here for a great cause: to support Pace and the girls they help,” Webb said before the races began.
“We’re just happy to help the girls,” Blenker added, with his dog, Luna, by his side.
The pre-race festivities started along the Bradenton Riverwalk at 11 a.m. and included food and drink vendors, duck race merchandise sales, children’s games, a display of race-themed models created by some of the fundraising teams, music and announcements by DJ Robert McDonald – with Bradenton Mayor Gene Brown, and his wife, Gina, in attendance.
At noon, the VID ducks competed in their own race before the main race began. The VID race started with the duck adopters throwing their duck as far down the race course as possible, on their way to the finish line.
The Anna Maria Oyster Bar/Oysters Rock Hospitality duck won the VID race and Trey Horne was crowned “King Duck.” Trey is the Oysters Rock Hospitality’s technology solutions manager. He’s also a Pace board member and the nephew of AMOB CEO John Horne.
During the main race that started at 12:30 p.m., more than 27,000-plus smaller ducks were released into a cordoned-off portion of the Manatee River, between the Bradenton Riverwalk Pier and the “Green Bridge”
After counting down from 10, all the small ducks were released from the bin and they meandered as a large, tightly-packed mass toward the finish line 100-150 feet away – with hundreds of spectators lined up against the Riverwalk safety rails watching them pass by.
During both races, there was a three-man “Duck Deployment Team” in the water. Jeff Curry and Chuck Knapp waded through the chest-deep water, following the ducks and grabbing the strays as they tried to escape from the race area boundaries designated by flotation noodles. Just outside the race area, Randy Haley used a kayak to chase down any ducks that broke free from the race area. Randy is the son of Pace Manatee Development Director Christi Haley.
Waiting at the finish line was a clear plastic tube into which the smaller ducks were funneled one-by-one before they emerged out the other end of the tube. Pace Manatee Executive Director Amy Wick Mavis and volunteer Abigail Koester (Randy Haley’s fiancé) stood in the river and received the winning ducks – grabbing each duck, from first place through 30th place, and placing it in a numbered bag.
After the race, several volunteers assisted in the removal of the ducks, with no duck left behind – a process that took about an hour to complete.
RACE WINNERS
The first-place grand prize was a free two-year lease on a Jeep (or $5,000) provided by Firkins Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram.
This year’s winning duck was adopted by the Women’s Club of Bradenton’s duck adoption fundraising team. After learning the club won the race, Women’s Club member Kellie Hoffmeister said the club would take the $5,000 to help fund future club endeavors.
The second-place duck was adopted by Robert Gause, through the Bradenton Kiwanis fundraising team. He won dinner for two every week for one year at any Anna Maria Oyster Bar location
The third-place duck Vicky Waters adopted from the AAUW Manatee Branch Team fundraising team earned her a $500 shopping spree at The Teal Turtle Boutique. Donated prizes were also given to the fourth-through-30th-place finishers.
THE REAL WINNERS
As is the case every year, the real winner was the Pace Center for Girls, Manatee.
When discussing Pace earlier in the week, Christi Haley said, “Pace is a school where girls can come to overcome their obstacles to success that they had in public school, or even a private school. We are a non-residential program. They come to us and they develop the tools they need to rewrite their story. They get counseling, academic training and we have a nurse on staff. We want each girl to write and reimagine the possibilities for her life. We’re giving her hope for her future. The girls stay in our program 12 months to two years; and the average is around 18 months. Our goal is to get them caught up academically while giving them some tools from their counseling. We then send them back to the public schools, but we stay with them for another year.
“We’re funded by the Department of Juvenile Justice and the Manatee County School Board. Any girl who resides in Manatee County is eligible to attend Pace free of charge, as long as she meets certain risk factors. For a girl that’s struggling a little and maybe just needs some tutoring, Pace is not her place.”
Pace Center for Girls, Manatee is currently operating at 4030 Manatee Ave. while the new $8 million Pace Center facility is being built at Pace’s longtime location on 26th Street West.
Learn more about Pace Center for Girls, Manatee website.
